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Intruder's killer: 'I had no choice'
Their eyes locked. Then Barbara Holland saw the barrel of the gun. She lay on the floorin her house after an intruder had knocked her down while pushing through her side door. While on her back, she drew a 9mm handgun from a holster on her waist. Her assailant's glare suddenly changed. "He looked surprised," Holland said.
Then she pulled the trigger. Holland, a 38-year-old Detroit business owner and mother, remembers firing three shots. Detroit police told her she fired six.
Either way, she killed the 42-year-old man, Clabe Hunt -- who had shoved into her home on Troester, near Hayes, on Detroit's east side at 8:10 p.m. April 13. He was an ex-con with five children and was armed with a loaded, nickel-plated semiautomatic handgun that was not registered to him. Autopsy reports indicate he was shot in the head multiple times. He never fired his weapon.
Police officers said Holland's gun was licensed, and they determined the shooting to be self-defense. Wayne County prosecutors continue to investigate, which is routine in most fatal shootings. Citizens defending themselves are precisely what backers of Michigan's controversial concealed-weapons law had in mind when they worked to pass the legislation in 2001. The law makes it easier for anyone without felony convictions or mental illnesses to obtain a permit to carry concealed weapons.
"The more the criminal element knows that Michigan residents can protect themselves and will protect themselves, the more crime goes down," said state Sen. Alan Cropsey, R-Dewitt.
Some opponents of the law predicted a large increase in self-defense-type shootings.
Gov. Jennifer Granholm, who opposed the measure when she was state attorney general, has acknowledged that has not occurred.
Posted by: Steve 2004-04-29 |
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